Gawker has learned that Smith is dating a 26-year-old Penn State grad and Fox Business producer named Giovanni "Gio" Graziano. According to multiple sources with knowledge of their relationship, the couple met sometime after Graziano started working at Fox Report in October 2011 as a production assistant. He's the man with whom Smith frequents Bathtub Gin.
"Yes, that's Shepard's boyfriend," Katya Minskova, the Bathtub Gin waitress Smith berated in March, confirmed to Gawker when shown a photo of Graziano. Another source who had seen them together at the Chelsea speakeasy confirmed Graziano's identity as well. Both sources say they saw Graziano and Smith together at the bar on multiple occasions, and that they appeared to be romantically involved.
While Smith and Graziano's boss Roger Ailes, a notorious homophobe, was apparently kept in the dark about the relationship - "higher ups had no idea" a source close to Graziano said - the pair doesn't appear to have gone to great lengths to keep the workplace romance from their co-workers.
"The people who know the most are [Graziano's] former coworkers from Fox," one source told Gawker. "One of the production assistants even saw him getting into Shep's limo one night earlier this year around 8 p.m. outside Fox, after Shep's show was over," the source added.